Week 2, Day 1: Tug-of-war robots!!

Our challenge for this week is to design and build a tug-of-war robot using Pilot Level 4 or Inventor Level 4 to program the robot. The objective of the tug-of war competition is to pull the opposing robot over the center line with a string that attaches to both robots. The battle commences when both the robots are activated by a sound sensor.

Our problem that we need to solve is that we need to make a robot that is not only powerful but is able to hold its own power; meaning it has to be heavy and able to stay in place during the tug-of-war competition. Also today we were trying to figure out how to work the programming and make it fit what we wanted the robot to do.  We were able to figure out the program and we created a “testing” program to help us build this robot to be as strong as it can be.

Takumi is in charge of writing the program and Chris and Danny are working on the robot itself. Lindsay is keeping track of our progress and helping out with ideas to make the robot stronger.  We are constantly changing our design every time after it is tested using the program that Takumi created. We were working out simple problems and working towards the best robot we can create. 

First, we tried using only one motor to just figure out how the gears were going to work with the motor. Once that idea was figured out, we added another motor. Chris is working on the design process. Another idea that came to our minds was to create a hook that grabs the rope from underneath and then it lifts up to grab the rope then it drags the other robot towards our robot.  Danny worked on that hook while Takumi programed the arm to a motor to help it attach during the competition. Once the main ideas were established, we started to work out the kinks and brainstorm ways to either add weight or create a more stable robot.  We attached the sound box that will allow the robot to start moving when a loud noise is made. Also we used the four wheels not as wheels, but as rubber stoppers that will create friction with the table and hopefully keep our robot in place.

We have two separate programs for each of the sets of motors. Two motors were programed together to help power the gear box. A separate program was created to power the arm that will pull the other robot towards our robot. With these two programs combined, we plan to dominate this competition and beat the other team’s robots.

At this point, we were still thinking about how we were going to even start to build the robot. Playing with the different Lego pieces always seems to spark some ideas that then hopefully turn into a final design.

 The photo above is of us during our original test runs that we did. We were just starting to add the wheels and arm to the robot.

This is our final design of the tug-of-war robot! It is ready to go and defeat all of the other robots in Wednesday's competition.

GO TEAM SWAG WAG!!! :)